Spotlight on: Books By the Bay Book Fair

A Unique Book Fair for a Unique Conference

If you know one thing about the Chanticleer Author Conference, you know it is unique. We specifically cater to already published authors and teach the tools they need to successfully sell and market their books.

Books by the Bay is also a unique book fair. Many conferences offer book rooms to sell the books of their presenters. At CAC the book room is for everyone! All attendees books may be sold in the book room!

And it is OPEN to the General Public for 3 days! 

Books by the Bay Facts:

1. The book room is fully staffed by Village Books – one of the top five best Independent Booksellers (rated by Publisher’s Weekly)
2. The book room is open to the public all three days of the conference
3. It stays open late on the night of the awards gala
4. Some of our big winners have sold out completely and gone on to receive special placement in the Village Books store long after the conference is over.
5. Other authors buy a lot of books, and bring friends to buy books, so a good elevator pitch is essential to bring along to the conference.

Everyone who registers for the conference will receive instructions, closer to the date, of how to enter books into the Village Books system for the event. The book room will be open all weekend for sale, and on the last day, Sunday, from 1pm to 4 pm, when conference sessions have ended the book room will transform into a festival of authors meeting and greeting the public, signing books, performing readings and more.

History of Books by the Bay and the Chanticleer Author Conference

Our First Poster

September 14, 2014 Chanticleer held the very first Books by the Bay, then known as the Books & Brews Book Fest, at Boundary Bay Brewery in Bellingham Washington. This was our very first Book Fest. And the inaugural Chanticleer Author Conference #CAC14 followed days later on September 19th. Looking even further back, the very first seed of the Chanticleer Author Conference was planted when we held our first awards gala in the summer of 2013.

In the second year of our book fest it was rebranded as Books by the Bay and relocated to the Hotel Bellwether, so that it could coincide with #CAC15 in September 2015. In the third year, we did something crazy and moved everything up to April 2016 (leaving us only 6 months to organize), so that we could give our awards out in a more timely fashion.

And here we are at #CAC17, our fourth conference, fourth book fair, and fifth awards gala. Whew! It’s been quite the ride.

We invite you to join us! Either by attending the conference and making your books available for purchase in the book room, or by dropping by to see what the book room has to offer, meet a few authors and support the creative community by buying some books.